Thanks to television & movies, I long ago learned that there are two sorts of people in the world. There are heros and there are sidekicks. Okay, there are also lackeys, fair damsels, evil arch villains and a support cast of thousands, but they don’t fit into this story so we’re going to leave them out of this. Now, where was I? Oh right; heroes and sidekicks.

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We all like to believe we’re the hero, the protagonist that leads with bravery and style. I have recently been made to realize however, that I am not the hero, but the sidekick. I knew this back in high school, but in the years since I escaped that Hell of homework and peer pressure I had come to hope I had grown as a person, become a hero in my own right. Alas, I was deluded. Now, there is nothing wrong with being the sidekick, without them the hero would never get anything done, but it’s a blow to the ego nonetheless.

In the past week or so I have been the recipient of several reminders of my place in the universal order. The first time was a simple enough matter of a friend of mine discovering she had grown up with an acquaintance we both knew from an online community. The issue was not this new connection, but the fact that suddenly I went from being a person in my own right to a mere conduit of information regarding my friend. “When will she be online, what are her work hours, is she single, what can you tell me about her?” I was transformed from a living, breathing person to a 411 operator; conversation was irrelevant, I was not even granted a greeting, just a barrage of inquiries.

A few days later I was shopping and stepped into a rather high end shop, a bit outside my usual comfort zone but not outside the realm of financial possibility. I had an experience not unlike that famous scene from the movie “Pretty Woman” where the star was ignored and eventually mocked for daring to step foot in their store. I was pointedly ignored, an invisible phantasm who did not even ping on the staff’s radar while they flocked to assist the person I was shopping with. Tick off another box in the sidekick list, even the cast of thousands seem to know my place in the grand order.

Over the weekend I received an Instant Message from my boss, a man I have known for six years and worked with for four. Did he wish to speak to me? Invite me out? Alas, no. He was just asking me to give him a mutual friend’s new phone number. They were going out for Dim Sum and wanted to invite her, did I know where she was?” It was then I finally made the connection and grasped the message the universe was giving me. “Pick out a goofy costume and find yourself a nickname, you’re the sidekick.”

If you need me, I’ll be browsing through the backroom of the local comic store, trying to find a cool sounding alter ego. “Nightwing” may be taken, but maybe they’ll let me use “Orko.”